gameofthronesfanonfandomcom-20200222-history
Tauren Starbane
Tauren Starbane, famously named the Black Bull, is an unseen character in the series. He is deceased when the series commences. He was the elder son of Drake Starbane, holding the title of Lord of the Stormlands. He was a famous warrior and vastly renowned for being the truest rival of House Baratheon of Storm's End until the Rebellion of Robert Baratheon. He was the last true lord of House Starbane, since all of his family was killed in the War of Stags and Bulls before he was finally killed at its climax. He is responsible for the famous and destructive War of Stags and Bulls against House Baratheon, and was climactically killed in combat at the Battle of Storm's End by Lord Jasper Baratheon. Biography Early life and marriage Tauren was the firstborn son of Drake Starbane and his wife Lavinia, the Lord and Lady of House Starbane, a noble house paired with House Baratheon as the two leading houses of the Stormlands. He was the first of six children to Lord and Lady Starbane and was considered the most handsome of them, as well as the best warrior. Tauren's brothers and sister were all people who adored and admired him for his diligence and inability to make an enemy of anyone, as even people who disliked him quickly came to like him almost more than his other friends did. Girl upon girl swooned over him, including the three Baratheon sisters of Storm's End, daughters of Lord Brynden Baratheon. However, he only had eyes for the outsider of the sisters - Valyrie Baratheon. The friendship between Tauren and Valyrie was more of an average friendship to her, but for him it was exponentially broader than this. Tauren impressed his family with his mind for strategy and negotiation, and was known to quickly end disputes and arguments with his words and his ability to cause other people to reconcile because other people admired him and respected his judgement. He was expected by his father to become a warlord, but it was explicitly confirmed that he had no interest in becoming such a person because he loved people too much to want to kill them. He was an extremely talented person - he read a lot more than his brothers, was an excellent singer (Was not afraid to sing publicly and in front of the Baratheon court), a talented strategist and a highly skilled swordsman. His talents caused him to attract a huge amount of admiration. He was presented with his family broadsword, which became his signature weapon in combat. This sword was mainly ceremonial, but Tauren would be the first man to wield it in battle. He was betrothed to Valyrie by his father when they were both eighteen years old, and consummated the marriage three nights later. After they were married, she got to know him a great deal better obviously and came to love him as much as he loved her, which is saying a great deal. When they were betrothed, it was commented that the look of joy in his eyes would have reduced children to tears at the sight of his happiness. They had a son, Jon, only days after his father died an old man. Tauren's joy eclipsed the joy he felt at his wedding, and it was rumoured that he would never be happier again, even in comparison with the immense pride that he experienced when his son first took up his sword. Tragedy While they were married, Tauren and Valyrie were famed for being one of the most exemplary pairings in the Seven Kingdoms, but not everybody was especially on board with the marriage and relationship that Tauren had with his wife. The more prominent of these was ironically Valyrie's sisters Scylla, Drisella and Bella, who were all married to lower lords and in unhappy marriages. On Scylla's prompting, all three of the sisters tried to periodically flirt and seduce Tauren, but he calmly and patiently turned them down without a single implication or intention of cruelty or apathy to their affections, but suspected that they were trying to pry him from Valyrie. The sisters secretly disowned Valyrie out of jealousy and conspired to remove her from the equation and take Tauren while he was mourning for themselves. They planned to lead her away from Tauren in order to do this, and in order for it to be accomplished they poisoned their father to draw Valyrie away from Tauren, who would later be made busy with uprisings in the south of the Stormlands. The sisters later drugged Valyrie, tied her arms and hung her off the ground in the dungeons of Storm's End, where they tiraded to her about taking what was rightfully theirs. Later, they stabbed her in the heart and killed her. Valyrie's body was dumped on the beach at Storm's End and Tauren discovered it, and his scream of rage could be heard far across the Kingsroad. When each of the sisters tried to empathise with him, it appeared that their attempts were half-hearted and easy for Tauren to see through, and he personally strangled Scylla with his bare hands, instigating the War of Stags and Bulls, so named for the primary combatants being House Baratheon and House Starbane. War of Stags and Bulls During the War of Stags and Bulls, Tauren fought as a front-line warrior and military leader, and immediately proved himself to be a terrifying opponent both strategically and in single combat. He named his family broadsword Valyrie's Vengeance since he planned to properly avenge his wife's death with the blade of the sword. A strategic genius, he named each of his siblings as lords and commanders of their own personal powerful armies, all of them taking the Stormlands and becoming locked in combat with the Baratheons in a number of raids on smaller wildling villages, massacring their way up to Storm's End. They were diverted when Lord Jasper Baratheon strategically diverted him over to Blackhaven, where the Battle of Blackhaven ended in stalemate since neither side could take the stronghold, but the Dondarrions took the side of the Starbanes in the end. The next battle, Tauren butchered his way through the enemy ranks and had the commanders thrown into the sea. This provoked further rage from the Baratheons, who pleaded with the Targaryens to join them in the war and give them the advantage, but House Targaryen refused. Tauren - sick with grief over his wife's death and inability to, in his mind, properly avenge her - realized that his hair was turning white, presumably as a result of his despair, so he had it shaved. He proceeded to have a helmet forged in the shape of a bull's head, to compensate since his long red hair originally made him frightening to behold in a fight, and the pretence of a charging armoured bull atop a mighty steed made him even more terrifying. He refused to negotiate unless it would be to bring him the heads of the remaining Baratheon sisters so that they could answer for their part in the murder, a crime that they weren't being admitted guilty to. During the Battle of Felwood, his appearance was so frightening that the first legion of soldiers literally turned and fled at the sight of him, enabling his army to sack the camps and burn it to ashes. There, Tauren was attacked by a stag while he was sleeping and killed it by smashing its neck against a jagged rock. This was interpreted somewhat by his men as an omen that he would literally break the Baratheons at the end of the battle, and caused even more men to believe in him and more houses to join him. However, this was taken controversially by some others in that it suggested Tauren was something of a brute, and this caused some houses to side with House Baratheon. When House Swann of Stonehelm defects from Tauren, being persuaded by Drisella Baratheon, Tauren rides with a third of his forces and wipes out their army, leaving the townspeople alive and moving on to Grandview and being barred from continuation by the Baratheons. A series of small battles strung across the Kingsroad, which eventually climaxed at the Mistwood, where Tauren was struck in one of the eyes of his helmet by an arrow and presumed killed when he fell from his horse. However, the eye was shaped so that, at the angle the arrow was flying, it was jammed in place just short of piercing Tauren. This led to the misconception that he couldn't be killed. Defeat at Storm's End However, Tauren recognized that the Baratheons were eclipsing his power with every house that joined them and they were already pulling in sellswords and wildlings to fight for them. He called on the Lannisters, who supported him with a multitude of weapons, while the Tyrells supported House Baratheon with horses and food. The war soon became something of a bidding conflict between the Lannisters and the Tyrells as well as an open clash between the Baratheons and the Starbanes. They were now, despite competing in what support they were receiving, becoming far more powerful, still narrowly eclipsing each other, and Tauren was soon met with a counterattack from his opponent, where they were driven back by the retaliating army to Summerhall, where they reclaimed the advantage and eventually beat back the Baratheon army back to Storm's End. The final battle of the war was fought when Tauren sneaked a small troupe of men into Storm's End, where they abducted the Baratheon sisters and brought them to Summerhall, where Tauren personally decapitated them with Valyrie's Vengeance, sending the heads back in boxes to Storm's End, declaring that the war was over since he had got what he had wanted. However, the Baratheons were furious and launched a full-scale assault on the Starbanes, who fought them back, at the cost of all four of Tauren's brothers, until began the massive Battle of Storm's End. During the Battle of Storm's End, Tauren's entire army spilled into the combat, with a ring of archers surrounding the castles and picking off multitudes of targets, restricting the Baratheons within their own castle. However, the Tyrells arrived with an army and forced the Starbanes back and the Baratheons joined them, spilling the combat back from the castle. Jasper Baratheon himself rode out into the battle and personally engaged in a terrifying duel with Tauren, which drove the two of them down to the shores of the Stormlands and into the shallows. During the duel, Tauren wounded his opponent with a headbutt that snapped the antlers on Jasper's helm and dazed him, but Lord Jasper Baratheon eventually struck Tauren down with a decapitating blow to the neck. Legacy Tauren Starbane's death signified the extinction of House Starbane and the climactic end to the War of Stags and Bulls. His life story is used as a catalyst for the teaching of how even the most beloved and magnificent of men could be shaken and upturned by wrath, and how that wrath could eventually destroy a person at an indeterminable cost. Melisandre is the only person with a fond memory of Tauren, since she had a private admiration and love for the man and an adoration for his diligence and charisma. It is speculated, highly possible (Though unconfirmed), that Melisandre once had romantic feelings for the Black Bull, like so many other women in his generation. Personality and Appearance Tauren Baratheon was famed for being very large and powerfully-built, estimately six feet nine inches. In his youth, he was extremely handsome and multitudes of girls and later women swooned over him and dreamed of marrying him or even being embraced by him. As a young man he apparently had blood-red hair that swept by his waist and lapped around his arms, but after the tragic death of Valyrie Starbane, his hair turned icy white and he shaved it. As an older man, he was still as tall as six feet, but bald with a thick spread of steely hair along the lower half of his face and the back of his head, and his thick brown eyes were suspicious and warning. He wore black chainmail and a leather chestplate, with iron armouring on his limbs and a helm styled like the head of a bull. He wielded a broadsword called Valyrie's Vengeance, and rode a huge black steed with a silver mane and tail. Tauren, as a boy, was extremely proud, strong, fearless and possessed an amazing mind for strategy and warfare, which was normally demonstrated in the games he played with the Baratheon children, but soon became proven to a fault on the battlefield. He was apparently a military master of tactics and had an incredible knowledge of battle formations and what measured the likelihood of triumph in a fight. He was also extremely charming as well as extremely handsome, and apparently an excellent singer, given that so many women and girls fawned over him and admired him throughout his life. According to Melisandre, he had a hypnotic voice that exuded authority, power and righteousness that would put every Baratheon and Lannister to shame. His charm enabled him to end negotiations peacefully stunningly quickly, and reason with his competitive brothers. As he grew up, Tauren became fixated romantically on Valyrie Baratheon, a childhood crush and obsession from his youth which eventually overgrew into a fierce longing for. When he was betrothed to her by his father, apparently the joy in his eyes would have reduced all children to tears at the sight of his absolute happiness. It was implied that he was unfailingly kind as well, in that Valyrie, who had an average friendship on her part with him to begin with, grew to love him almost as much as he loved her. When they bore a son, it was apparent that Tauren was never happier than he was when he cradled the infant and was incalculably proud when Jon Starbane first gripped a sword in his hands. Despite the fact that he loved Valyrie so much, he was not bitter or resentful towards the three Baratheon sisters who also expressed romantic feelings towards him. He was also unfailingly civil towards Melisandre when she expressed the same feelings. However, when Valyrie was murdered in jealousy by Scylla Baratheon, Tauren became furiously wrathful and obsessed with avenging her, waging a brutal war across the Stormlands that spanned for the rest of his life and forged his permanent memory in the minds of all men but Melisandre that he was a ruthless and genocidal warlord and a probable tyrant. He was absolutely ruthless in his war and did not resort to mercy upon opponents or prisoners if it obstructed him from taking his revenge. His reputation and talent for being a master strategist was demonstrated in every possible way as a result of the Baratheons being one of the most militarily powerful houses in Westeros and proving to be a nigh-impossible opponent. Category:Characters from the Stormlands Category:Lords Category:Male Category:Nobles Category:Deceased Category:Status: Dead Category:Warrior Category:Characters from Westeros Category:Siblings Category:Nobility Category:Characters Category:Mentioned Characters